e brushed by us to the control booth
and slammed the door behind him. A half-hour later he came out and again
went to the telescope. Glancing through it, he made adjustments and then
read them. Dashing back to the table he again scribbled some figures.
When he had finished he stood there, his head bowed, staring at them.
Then he looked up at our faces and said solemnly, "What I have been
fearing in the back of my mind has happened. The tellecarbon no longer
responds to mental suggestion. It has taken over control of the ship
itself and, judging from our present course, we aren't going to ever get
to Mars."

"What do you mean?" Lahoma asked.

"I mean," Jud answered slowly, "that at present we have a velocity great
enough to escape from the solar system and that it is increasing every
moment. Furthermore, a half-hour of concentration on the tellecarbon has
not altered our course in the slightest. Wherever we are headed, it is
not any planet in this system!"

* * * * *

The effect of his words cannot be imagined by anyone not in the position
we were in. We stood there stunned. Our little, spinning world of iron
and steel kept on spinning. Our gravity, which we had become accustomed
to, was different in many ways than flat gravity. For example, our floor
was curved, yet a dime dropped on it would roll in any direction along
the curve just like it was a flat surface. But something near the center
tube of the ship was practically weightless. So the center of gravity of
our bodies was not the same as its center of mass. This made itself felt
in thousands of little things. Heart action, sense of balance, and even
in walking.

Picture, if you can, Jud standing several feet from me, his body forming
an angle of about thirty degrees with mine, both of our bodies erect,
our expressions serious. Picture also Lahoma and Mallory, their bodies
at still different angles. Throw in the absolute silence of that moment.
Not a single sound except our breathing, not even a creak from the ship.
If there had only been a cricket to chirp, or a snake, or a fly buzzing,
to make it seem like good old terra firma--but there was only the
interstellar silence and the absolute lack of vibration in the air and
the ship. And nearly two months of it, soaked into the marrow of our
bones.

I for one would have welcomed a hit against the hull at that moment to
take us out of ourselves and make us fight for our existence.